


Touch

by StarWarsSpoonShip



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi
Genre: After TLJ, F/M, Fighting the Praetorian Guards, Force Bond (Star Wars), Hand Touch, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Secret Relationship, Soulmates, Throne Room
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2018-04-04
Packaged: 2019-02-23 09:57:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13187682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarWarsSpoonShip/pseuds/StarWarsSpoonShip
Summary: The touch of her lips had burned away the words at the tip of his own. Light side, dark side, the Sith, the Jedi, the Rebellion, the First Order and all the power in the galaxy that was here for the taking–none of it mattered more than the sweet warmth of her breath ghosting against his skin as she gasped.





	1. Chapter 1

The hut was primitive. Forged from slates of the volcanic island rock and unchanged over the ages, it kept out the worst of the rain, but did nothing to quell the damp.

The girl huddled within was on the cusp of twenty. Her hair was soaked and rivulets ran down her slender frame. Her dark eyes were red rimmed, and wet trails glistened on high cheekbones. Yet beyond the tears was a hint of depth and a glimmer of more–a light within her that could not be driven away, and a strength that came from more than the lean wire of her muscle.

She had peeled off her cowl and thrown it to a low table where it dripped into puddles. After the day’s heavy calorie expenditure, she should have reached for her rations. Instead she sat on cold tiles, vaguely in front of the outdated heating unit that was doing little to keep her warm.

She felt it then–the pulse of energy, the power of an ancient religion. The drum of rain, the distant crash of waves and the calls of wild fowl ceased. Even the chill faded. The only noise was her own sharp breaths, until that sound was mingled with those of another in the empty room.

It was him.

He wasn’t truly here, in this room with her. There were whole galaxies between them. But it was more than a vision of him. Even as he towered over her, she could smell leather mixed with the spice of his lotion.

She never asked for this connection between them, and had no idea why the Force linked them together again. For this man was dangerous. His expressive eyes only hinted at the darkness within him. But as his gaze drifted over her crouched form and hasty attempt to brush at her cheeks, he sank down to a seated position, until he was level with her.

“Rey?” His voice was soft.

Rey pressed her lips into a thin line. _I shouldn’t say anything._

He looked to her as if she spoke the words aloud, and waited.

He was listening. Flickers of curiosity rippled at the edge of their bond, and his quiet attention felt just enough like a kindness. She should call him a monster. She should tell him to back away. She was so tired.

“I thought I’d find answers here.” Rey admitted, willing her frustration to subside. But her thoughts drifted unerringly back to the cave. It had called to her in whispered promises and she gave in, at that cold rocky edge. She had begged to see them–the parents she had waited so long for. For one shining moment, as the image in the walls crystallized, she thought that she would. Instead the cave showed her standing by herself.

His gaze was fixed on her, and Rey wondered how much of her thoughts he had seen. There was no hiding from him like this.

Rey shook her head. It was all for nothing. “I was wrong. I’ve never felt so alone.”

“You’re not alone.” He murmured.

No one had ever said that to her before. Surprised, Rey looked at him, reading into the earnest set of his expression, and saw the compassion there. He understood. If there was anyone else who knew what it meant to be alone, it was him. This was a man who was cut off from the rest of the world because of his strength, because of his connection to the Force, because he could do things and see things that no one else could.

They were alike in their loneliness.

“Neither are you.” Emboldened by her revelation, Rey held out her hand to him. “It isn’t too late.”

Without hesitation, he pulled off his glove. Slowly, as if he was coaxing a wild animal, he reached out to her, and the galaxies between them were replaced by this general space between a girl and a boy.

At the first touch of warm flesh, Rey heard the hum and clash of laser swords. She saw a flash of the future–he turned against his master and he did it for her. That was his black cloak billowing over the corpse, and his gaze on hers was heated passion.

She saw his plump lips pressed against her own, and felt the phantom heat of his hands skimming over her back and tangling into her hair. Coaxing pressure parted her lips and he slipped through, twisting her up with desire. The sight of it heated her, warming a spot just behind her navel, even as she tried and failed to push the vision away.

More than anything else she saw the light tearing away at the darkness within him, and how the conflict was ripping him apart.

“Stop!” The yell was fierce anger pushed through gravely vocal chords.

The harsh cry jolted Rey out of her vision. She hadn’t even noticed that her reluctant teacher, Luke Skywalker, had opened the door on them. The strength of his objection ripped through the ancient stone, hurling it apart. The entire roof exploded outwards, in a rush of power.

Rey paused, looking across the ruined hut to check on her visitor. He was indeed gone, their connection blown away along with the tiles. Piercing rain fell, soaking her through once more.

How dare he? Skywalker destroyed this, simply because he didn’t understand. She wouldn’t let this pass.

_I’m coming to you._ She whispered through their bond.  
She didn’t need to see Ben Solo to know that he had received the message.


	2. Chapter 2

An imposing figure stood alone on the command bridge of the Supremacy. Upper levels of the First Order Navy flagship were clear of officers or any legions of stormtroopers. There would be no distractions.   
  
The man who named himself Kylo Ren was left alone to brood. Behind his mask he could pretend that he was more machine than man. Now without it, he could do nothing to hide his expressive eyes, nor the dark unfamiliar passion stirring within him.  
  
He clenched his leather gloves tight, willing the throb of pain to clear his mind. His stillness belied the rage coursing through him, as the broad muscles of his back tensed and his heart beat hard enough to hear the pounding in his ears. He gritted his teeth as his own body betrayed him. But nothing could dull the weakness taking root. Nothing could suppress the object of his obsession from resurfacing in his thoughts.  
  
“It is you.” He was so lost, he barely realized that he had uttered the damning words out loud.  
  
She had haunted his visions long before coming into her power–the fierce warrior who had bested him on Starkiller Base. From the time of his awakening in the Force, he would catch glimpses of her, always obscured behind goggles and face mask as well as the blaze of desert sands. He could barely remember a time when her lithe form wasn’t scurrying away from him in a dream, in a premonition. Always just out of his grasp.  
  
Rather than taking away the mystery, seeing her in person inflamed him. Now that they had crossed paths, he had to know. Last time, he had underestimated her, and allowed her to slip away. It couldn’t happen again. He had to have her.  
  
He felt it then, a shift in the Force. It was as though a doorway unlocked. He could almost hear the thrum of power as the pathways opened to him. The click of droids, electronic pulses and hum of equipment, all fell away as his focus shifted deeper within his own mind. Everything else gone, he nearly gasped when he heard her delicately draw breath. As it had done throughout the course of his life, the Force was connecting him to her. There had to be a reason why. He turned toward the sound of her.  
  
The girl was clutching her knees, her shoulders shaking. Tears trickling down, mixed into her sodden clothing. She hastily dragged her knuckles across her cheeks as if destroying the evidence would hide away her feelings. Her pain was blinding. What happened to her? She had always been filled with light, so intense. What had happened to the warrior? His fierce girl.  
  
He knelt down to her, as if the closeness in proximity would clear away her secrets.

“Rey.” He murmured.

_ I shouldn’t say anything. _ Even her thoughts were drained, bone tired.

He shifted his concentration over her, subtly checking for injuries. He lingered over the curves and dips of her form, tracing the toned muscle of her arm, her slender neck, the arch of her back. All is familiar to him and nothing is out of place. Physically she is unharmed.  
  
“I thought I’d find answers here.” Rey admitted.  
  
She remembers a cave, heavy with the cloying influence of the dark. He sees her shuddering breath as she steels herself, and presses the tips of her fingers against cold unforgiving stone. ‘Show them to me.’ Her voice is desperate. ‘Show me my parents. Please.’ From within the rock walls, two figures drift close to the fingers still connected to primordial stone. Yet, the image clears, and she stands abandoned.  
  
“I was wrong. I’ve never felt so alone.” Her voice is defeated. But it doesn’t have to be.  
  
“You’re not alone.” He reassures her. She had never been alone; her fate had always been interconnected with his.  
  
“Neither are you.” Tentatively she opened her palm and reached out to him. “It isn’t too late.”  
  
As slow as he dares, he pulls off his glove. He reached for her in a smooth measured pace, determined not to scare her off. Determined to catch her this time.  
  
As he touched impossibly soft skin, he heard the clatter of glass toppling and the crash as it shattered. Dark liquid sloshed heavy on the floor, soaking into sand that had spilled into corners of the tight dwelling.  
  
A too thin man cries out, and falls to the ground, attempting to scoop the liquid into his hand. Frantically, uselessly, he swept it away from the tiles in great strokes.  
  
A spindly woman grabs a child roughly by the shoulders. ‘What have you done now?’ The words are punctuated by harsh shakes. ‘What did I tell you was going to happen?’  
  
‘I’ll be good! I’ll be good!’ The little girl cries in a broken protest.  
  
Even marred with grief and separated by years in the past, Kylo Ren would recognize those features anywhere. All the numbers she had carved out, the hours staring into an empty horizon–for parents who had long ago burnt out their pathetic lives.  
  
He sees Rey at his back, as the two of them fight off their enemies, perfectly in sync.    
  
He sees Rey standing by his side. She leans against him, slender palm against his chest. Her dark eyes are fixed on him in adoration.    
  
He saw himself joined with her, their bodies free and unadorned moving together in a primal dance. His lips press to that sleek neck, as his hands dig into lithe hips. Rey tosses her head back and whispers his name.  
  
His eyes widen at this promise of connection.  
  
“STOP!”  
  
The cry jolts him out of his vision. Kylo Ren looks to the side and feels the presence of Luke Skywalker, feels a push with Luke’s energy signature. Before he realized what happened, he was alone back on the Supremacy.  
  
She was gone.  
  
Kylo Ren shot to his feet, lightsaber clenched in his grip, as rage contorts his features. He ignities it, the beam thrums to life like liquid fire. How dare he. How fucking dare he. He sweeps the lightsaber up into a high arch, ready to slash the walls of the command deck, ready to burn it all.  
  
_I’m coming to you._ She whispers to him, and he hears it through the bond.  
  
Kylo Ren blinks at the message, and switches off his saber.  
  
He pressed his ungloved palm against his forehead, as if he could capture her words there, and hold them in his mind, keeping her with him. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Throne Room

She felt it still—the connection that sparked into her awareness when she first touched his hand. It pulsed through her, pulling her to him, as if the energy that beckoned was a living breathing thing. The strength of it when they were galaxies apart is nothing to the siren call of him now. She had come to him. 

His face is blank and she can feel the resolve building within him, like layers of steel flexing and hardening. She has never seen him so expressionless. But he could not deny this pull, no more than she could.

It didn't matter that she was handcuffed, that he was taking her to see his master. There was good in him. Even now she could  _ feel  _ it. “You don't have to do this. I feel the conflict in you, it's tearing you apart.”

“Ben.” Rey turned to face him. His eyes flicked to her, and his cold demeanor softened. “When we touched hands I saw your future. Just the shape of it, but solid and clear.” The broken parts of him, where the light shines through, are like stars. Bright flames in the darkness.  _ It's beautiful.  _ Does he not see what he is doing to himself? “You will not bow down to Snoke. You'll turn.” Rey stepped closer, unable to fight the draw to him, that hope flickering in his dark eyes. She lowered her voice, though it is just the two of them. Even as the elevator rises ever closer to Snoke–his master, her enemy. “I'll help you. I swear it.”

His lips were so close. All she had to do was lean in, to capture them.  _ It would be so easy. _

“I saw something too.” His voice is low and husky, these words are just for her. “Because of what I saw, I know that when the time comes you will be the one to turn. You'll stand with me. Rey, I saw who your parents are.”

It took Rey a second to register that the shocked inhale was her own, as she stepped away from him. Before she could take the time to sift through those words, familiar in isolation, but incomprehensible strung together, the doors to the lift opened behind her.

Beyond the lift doors was a blood red room, framed by masked soldiers leaning their weapons aggressively, and a man hunched casually on his throne. A slash carved his face, deep enough that it should have killed him but instead split his features asymmetrically. His skin was deeply furrowed, as if twisted in an effort to escape the dark energy twisting within. So this was Snoke.

For a moment she was frozen, but Ben’s warm touch on her back pressed her gently forward. They strode into the throne room together, and Rey continued alone as Ben Solo dropped to a kneel behind her.

“Well done my good and faithful apprentice. My faith in you is restored.” Snoke’s voice stretched out boastfully across the room. “Young Rey. Welcome.”

She felt a ripple in the force before her handcuffs disengaged and fell to the ground.

“Come closer child.” Snoke beckoned. Though his words were thick and layered with seductive power, there were no good intentions here. While Ben was shadow struck through with light, there was nothing redeemable in Snoke’s darkness.

“So much strength. Darkness rises and light to meet it. I warned my young apprentice that as he grew stronger, his equal in the light would rise.” Smoke pulled with the force and the lightsaber grasped in Ben Solo’s hand ripped away, sailing to Snoke’s side. “Skywalker I assumed. Wrongly.”

Eyes that were too pale and too milky, narrowed at her. “Closer I said.”

Rey felt herself pulled from the ground, her feet trailed across the floor as she was dragged closer to the dark creature. She would not be cowed by him. “You underestimate Skywalker. And Ben Solo. And me. It will be your downfall.”

He gasps. “Have you seen something? A weakness in my apprentice, is that why you came?” His expression of fear clears with a cruel chuckle. “Young fool. It was I who bridged your minds. I stoked Ren’s conflicted soul. I knew he was not strong enough to hide it from you. And you were not wise enough to resist the bait.”

He pulled her closer, and the only thing she could see was his bulbous face leering at her. Mocking her. “And now, you will give me Skywalker, and I will kill you with the cruelest stroke.”

“No.” Rey took in hard breathes, bracing herself against what she knew was to come, as his hand clutched her face and dug in like claws.

“Yes.” Snoke bit out.

He pushed her with the force, and she could do nothing to break the hold. “Give me everything.”

Rey felt the grasp of it as it jerked her up into the air and held her there. It was as if a noose wrapped itself around her mind, and the rope pulled tight. He gripped her mind, bearing down tighter and tighter, until she was sure that her head was going to be crushed.

The pressure constricted then he was in her mind and everywhere. She couldn’t move, couldn’t stop it. She could feel him in her memories, in thoughts and feelings that belonged to her. His sharp bladed edges pierced into her deeper, searching. He tore through chunks of memories, ripping in and branding them with his dark imprint.

She couldn’t do anything. Couldn’t stop the screams that tore out of her throat without her permission.

Rey dropped, and landed with a thud, echos of stabbing pain jolted through her. She twisted and had reached out halfway to Ben, before she heard the hearty laughs that chilled her.

Snoke was bent over laughing, at her expense. Laughing at knowledge that belonged to her. “I did not expect Skywalker to be so wise. We will give him and the Jedi Order, the death he desires. After the rebels are gone we will go to his planet and obliterate the entire island.”

Rey stood, ignoring the thudding pain in her head.  _ No.  _ She couldn't let this monster hunt down the others, let him kill her friends, using stolen secrets.

She called Skywalker's lightsaber to herself, as it swung towards her, she felt the pull of dark intent wrap around the saber. It swung wide out of her grasp and then the metal edge of it slammed into the back of her head.

The blow knocked her off her feet, as her vision whited out in a flash of pain. She forced herself back to her feet, and blinked twice to get reoriented. As her vision cleared, she saw Snoke’s smirking face, with Luke Skywalker’s lightsaber back at his side.

That look of contempt snapped something in her. Rage filled her, she let all of the pain in her aching head fuel it, as she turned and summoned Ben Solo’s lightsaber. It detached from his belt and soared straight to her. The saber ignited and it's beam was red flame, an extension of her anger.

Snoke held out one hand to still the guards. “Oh. Still that fiery spit of hope. You have the spirit of a true Jedi.”

Rey charged at him, holding Ben’s lightsaber in a high arch, but she only made it a half a dozen steps before Snoke’s energy bound her, and threw her off her feet, casting the lightsaber out of her hands.

Snoke’s eyes narrowed. “And because of that you must die.”

She felt the energy, darkening as it jerked her up to her knees, and spun her around to face Ben Solo.

“My worthy apprentice,” Snoke addressed Ben. “Son of darkness. Heir apparent to Lord Vader. Where there was conflict I now sense resolve. Where there was weakness, strength. Complete your training and fulfill your destiny.”

Ben’s gaze held hers, eyes sad in an otherwise blank face. He leaned down and picked up his lightsaber, his focus never moving away from her. “I know what I have to do.”

Those words, those same words that he had uttered before he struck down his own father. Rey paused in her struggle against the tight darkness that confined her.  

“Ben.” She called to him.

“You think you can turn him? Pathetic child,” Snoke mocked her. “I cannot be betrayed. I cannot be beaten. I see his mind. I see his every intent.” Slowly, Ben turned his lightsaber around, until the dark mouth of the blade emitter faced her. “Yes. I see him turning the lightsaber to strike true.”

Her gaze was fixed on Ben’s haunted eyes, feeling her way through Snoke’s hold to the connection that still held them fast. Rey wouldn’t look away from him. She was here for him, she swore it.

“And now foolish child he ignites it and kills his true enemy.” Snoke roared, his words laced through with bloodlust.

Rey tumbled to the floor, the slice of a plasma blade echoed loud across the throne room. She turned in time to see Snoke glaring in confusion at the split ruins of his body.

Ben summoned the legacy lightsaber of Luke Skywalker and it flit back across the room, severing off Snoke’s hand and rending his body in half. Snoke’s torso hit the ground with a dull thud, and Rey reached up and grabbed the saber.

As Rey got back to her feet, she heard his voice brush the edge of her consciousness, in a warm murmur.  _ I won’t let anyone hurt you. _

Ben Solo saved her. She stared back at him in numb gratitude.  _ Neither will I.  _ Rey whispered through the bond. 

There was no time to say more. She sensed malevolent energy, and the cackle of weaponry buzzing into life–the danger pressing in all around them. They turned back to back, as the guards rushed in, and struck hard against the wave of them.

She could sense his force signature so strongly, it might as well have been a physical presence–a lingering shadow. She could feel the power behind his charge, could feel when he needed her. He had locked blades and she twisted around and thrust her saber into a particularly lethal guard.  

And he could tell when she needed him. As three of the elite guards rushed at her, Ben drew nearer and Rey braced against him, to launch herself into a kick. Rey forced them back, separating some out from the melee.  

They struck hard, but Rey met the blows of the guard with pure ferocity, slashing one through the belly. But the other locked her lightsaber, in the current of an electric-chain whip, pulling Rey in, and grabbing her by the throat. But this was the dirty violence she knew, back when she thought the force was a myth. Before she knew any of it, and grappled with a simple brutality on the sands of Jakku. Rey jerked free from his hold, and rotated her saber straight through his chest.

No sooner had Rey swung free, when another guard separated his vibroblades and slashed ambidextrously with the pair. Rey drew power from the well of pain in her throbbing head, and charged at the guard, a yell springing loose from her lips.

She swung defensively against the twin blades, holding the guard at bay. When she wasn't quick enough he slashed her forearm with an electric burn. Rey was pushed back, keeping her distance, but the guard still managed to latch on to her sword arm, locking it in place behind the handle of his blade. Rey dropped her weapon, breaking lose. She dipped down to catch it and slashed through his knees then across his neck in rapid succession. 

With the other enemies put down, Rey looked to Ben, and found him in a headlock, choked behind metal.

“Ben!” Rey called out, as she threw her lightsaber across the room to him. Ben caught it, igniting the light blade straight into the eye of the guard, killing him instantly.

Ben cast off the dead man, his eyes on hers the whole time. He stepped towards her with an expression that was raw and looked like nothing so much as a hunger.

For a moment that look terrified Rey in a way that nothing else in the throne room had terrified her. Because it was real. Because it was everything she had been denied for her entire life. 

Rey took a deep breath, and stepped forward to meet him. Drawn to him, by the pull of their connection, by that tentative gleam of hope within him. By an attraction she tried to hide even from herself. Had she really never noticed how the darkness within him smoldered? How long had she wanted just a taste of its heat?

She placed her hands on his chest and leaned in, stretching up on the front of her toes. She pressed her lips against his, and felt the light brush of skin against skin. She had never wanted anything more in her entire life than this one simple kiss from this broken man’s lips.

The small point of contact sent a pulse through the force. A thrumming electric cackle, before the air felt pulled tight in anticipation. As raw energy gathered around them thickening and swirling, like they were the eye of the storm.

He groaned and pulled her flush against his hard edges. The caress of his lips seared her, with a rush of warmth that she could feel down to her toes. His mouth moved desperately, a hot pressure unraveling her. He peeled her back to the core, to that girl forged by abandonment, burning away all her loneliness. This kiss was everything, answering questions, where words have failed.

She slipped her hands up in the silk of his hair, as the kiss deepened. As around them the force mirrored their passion with a heady vibration that was almost sensual.

“Marry me.” The words slipped out of his mouth in a dark whisper the moment they parted. Then his lip trembled, and he looked so vulnerable, and just so human, that it took Rey a moment for the meaning to sink in.  

Rey blinked. “Are you asking me to turn?”

Ben tightened his hold on her, as if he were terrified that she would try to run away. “I’m not asking you to choose a side. Just me.”

Rey cupped her hand against his cheek, feeling the tremors of dark power within him, feeling the blossoming of light, of hope. And the warmth of the man underneath it all. They were on opposite sides of the war, opposite sides of the force.

There would be no easy fix, no simple way to just figure this out. A relationship between the two of them didn't make any sense. And now that she got a taste of him it would be impossible to let him go.

 


	4. Chapter 4

The touch of her lips had burned away the words at the tip of his own. Light side, dark side, the Sith, the Jedi, the Rebellion, the First Order and all the power in the galaxy that was here for the taking–none of it mattered more than the sweet warmth of her breath ghosting against his skin as she gasped.  
  
When he drew away from her, the last words that mattered to him escaped. “Marry me.”

His desires hung vulnerably in the quiet between them.

There were monsters in her past–revealing them would make her run, possibly straight into his arms. But his mouth refused to voice them and the words died, halted by the memory of her kiss. He wouldn't hurt her. Wouldn't say it.

Fear spiked through her mind like static. He could practically smell the bitter metallic tang of it. She bit her lower lip. “Are you asking me to turn?”

Not anymore. Not at the cost of losing her.

His arms tightened reflexively around her. Trying to draw her physically closer even as her emotions drew her away. “I’m not asking you to choose a side. Just me.”

She took a deep breath, and determination blazed through her in a flash of bright energy, as she reached out to him. Soft fingertips trailed across his skin as she cupped her hand against his cheek.

Her eyes searched his. “Why do you want to marry me? You barely know me.” 

“I know you.” His heart pounded with the truth of it. “For as long as I can remember I’ve known you. I’ve seen you in my dreams, in my visions. The Force has always connected us.”

“A Force connection isn’t reason enough.”

“I know what I want.” With the first touch of his hand to hers, he knew that he would kill Snoke for her. He would rip the world apart to keep her safe. He pressed his forehead against hers, and closed his eyes against the warm lull of her presence. “Tell me you don’t feel this too.”  

She slipped her hand into his hair, interweaving her fingers lightly into the strands. “I can’t abandon my friends.”

“If that's what you want.” Resistance? Order? What was the point of a structured society if she wasn't in it?

“Yes.” Rey’s voice was so soft, that at first he didn’t understand. But he saw it in her eyes, in the shy spark of hope. That she  _ trusted  _ him. That she wanted this too. 

He drew in one sharp breath, searching her feelings in disbelief. And then he was on her. 

His hands pressed into the curve of her hip, the arch of her back, melding those gentle curves to him, as he kissed her. The taste of her lips was every forbidden thought, every sweet dream denied him. He tried to savor it, to bask in this moment of carnal pleasure. But he found himself clutching Rey tighter, his heart pounded faster, as his body demanded more. Passion unlocked something wild within him, and he couldn't get enough.

He broke away from her, and forced his breathing to calm. There would be time for that later. He was going to do things right. “Come with me.”

They took Snoke’s escape shuttle–it was the closest transportation available, and with the Supreme Leader lying in pieces in the throne room, now was not the time for explanations. He had more important things to concern himself with.

His lips and one arm broke from her–just long enough to twist around and plot a course to the desert planet Cantonica. It met his qualifications by being close, and more importantly discrete. Then he backed her up against the cold durasteel and spent the rest of the flight memorizing the curves and soft press of Rey’s hot mouth–he almost didn’t notice the jolt as the Upsilon-class  shuttle dropped out of hyperspace, or the alert for landing procedures, as they descended on Canto Bight.

Before them, the lights of the Canto Casino glittered into view like the sparkling facets of a kyber crystal. Kylo reluctantly pulled away from Rey, and went back to the navigation system where he hastily typed out a communication.

A robed valet took one look at the sharp cut of his imperial robes and bowed sharply, before hurrying out of their way. He was replaced by a service manager, who sidled up to them obsequiously. Kylo took Rey’s hand, refusing to give up the subtle connection, as they were guided past the ritzy clamor of the gambling floor.

As Rey watched the gamblers, a wave of uncertainty flit through her mind.

Kylo brushed his thumb against her knuckles, in a gentle caress. “What is it?”

She bit her lip, before admitting, “I’m not dressed for this.”

Her oversized tunic was burned in places by electro-plasma blades. Exposed at her shoulder, was a cauterized slash, still fresh and grisly. She didn’t look like a typical bride, and she didn’t have to. Rey was raw power.

Kylo shook his head. “You’re perfect.”

 

Their walk brought them before a solemn Yuzuum, in a sleek gaberwool tuxedo, who asked them in heavily accented basic if they were ready to begin. 


End file.
